The question for me is - did AVB start Ade and Defoe because he believes it is the best formation for us (and if that is the case why has he held off doing it before?) or did he bow to pressure and played them both reluctantly? I think sadly it was the latter and thats a shame.

I don't understand why he goes for Gallas over Dawson and of course I am completely amazed he seems to like Hudd so much.

Up until Adebyor went mad (what he did was so stupid as to be mental) we looked in control and well able to win that game. What I can't get my head around is AVB pretty much exhonerating Adebyor AND saying that we deserved to win the game!! What planet is he on? Yes we tried very hard and there was no lack of effort, but we never looked like winning that game after the sending off and to say different is ridiculous.

All AVB did today, IMO, is confirm what I thought about him already. Fruitcake!

Bow to pressure from who? The trash rags? The fans? Isn't one of the oft quoted failings of AVB that he's so arrogant he refuses to change his beliefs and systems for anyone?

I don't think it's anything as schoolboy as either of those reasons; I think it was a different game and he played it on it's individual merits. I think he knows Ade tend to perform against his ex-clubs and Dempsey hasn't been doing that well recently, so dropped one, brought the other in, and played the formation to suit the players playing. I think he also knows that the atmosphere of the derby means it will instinctively be more attacking than a 'normal' game, so suits an additional forward - I don't think any of this is unexpected.

I couldn't watch the first 25 mins so followed on the BBC's min by min, interestingly (I think, anyway...) it sounded on that like Hudd was in the middle of a lot of the key plays, but when I arrived the people watching the match hadn't really noticed it. I'm not sure why that might be - there are certain players I think can be overlooked/not noticed when they're doing a good job, but you can't really miss Hudd's hair, and he's not a player like Bale who the mbm-ers seem to big up unless he's having an absolute stinker, it's bizarre.

I accept AVB went too far with his post-match comments - if we ship 5 goals when we're "in control" I dread to think what happens when we're not! - but I took the majority to mean that we really went for it and we *could* have had a different result on another day yada yada yada, not we deserved the win - as I said, if the Bale effort had gone in (apparently it was about 70 mins not 60 as I said before) it would have been a different game, I reckon we'd have at least got the draw. And what point would there have been in vilifying Adebayor? He made a silly mistake, it clearly wasn't intentional and he clearly instantly regretted it, what's the point in him rubbing salt in the wound? Is that going to build a team spirit or keep a confidence striker in form?

Yeah, it's a lousy final score, but I really don't see how the manager can be blamed for that. Adebayor aside, I also think it's pretty difficult to single any player out of criticism, there were some mistakes made by most players - for example, Vertongen generally had a great game, but pretty sure (my memory's hazy now) he made a mistake which led to one of the Arsenal goals. I'm not going to jump on him for that as he was generally brilliant, but it happened and that's not down to AVB or any of the players who seem to have been singled out as whipping boys.

The impact of Ade being sent off - what will AVB do for the next three games? Two derbies and the Pool?

Given he favoured playing Daffy with Dempsey/Sig before, presumably he'll just revert to type - as he doesn't really have much option does he (although I think he may be wary of playing Dempsey against Fulham)?

Still only 6 points off 4th and 2 points off sixth, but six points is still two more wins than the 4th placed team. To put that in perspective, 6 points below us are Wigan in 16th.

As for most of the season, there's very little option. The changes I would make against WH, would be dawson over gallas, against Caroll, and I'd give Carroll a game over Hudds if Dembele's still not fit.

Tend to agree with JeeRoo on the Adebayor opinion. A typical over enthusiastic striker's wade in against a former club. I was going to say a (niave) selection on the part of Boras but I can't spell it. H

Up untill the sending off, i thought we were slightly the better team, 1-0 up, a goal disallowed and Lennon missing narrowly,and you could almost hear the arse fans pooing thier pants.Then Ade goes and fcuks it all up with a stupid challenge in an area that was threatening nothing.(stupid boy),and this was the catalyst for the arse to attack.Fair play to AVB for the changes and i thought we looked totally up for a fight back.but when your'e 3-1 up you can afford to soak up a bit of pressure and with only 3 at the back you can always get caught out.The arse scored 3 sh1t goals but at the end of the day as long as the ball hits the back of the net is all that cares.Gallas was poor again and gave the ball away far too easily for me and surely AVB must start to realise that DAWS is a far better CB than Gallas(when will the penny drop?).Carroll done well when he came on and showed desire to get into the game and along with his pace proved much more worthy than Hudd in the middle.Sadly Dembele looked average again and apart from 1 moment of note,his lack of pace and skill brings nothing to the game,not sure if SIG was available but for me he would have been a far better choice.Anyway a decent performance from 10 men and look forward to meeting them at the LANE.PS as for little frakus with BALE and WILTSHIRE i would be happy to pay good money and go and watch Bale punch 10 bale's of sh1t out of the little fcuker.Every time there was an incident, he was there moaning,-maybe he's suffering from small man little dick syndrome.Chins up.......COYS....SPURS ...FOREVER Jeffall

The decision to get rid of Harry for AVB was a strange one for me, even stranger was the decision to overlook Moyes for the then vacant manager's position. I remember watching an interview on Sky Sport News where David Moyes was asked specifically in their studio on whether there has been any contact from Spurs before AVB was appointed and Moyes said that he hasn't had any approach from Spurs. He was also asked if he would be interested in becoming Spurs manager and he replied that any ambitious manager would love to manage any team with Modric, Bale, VDV and Lennon in the side.

Ade cost us that game, we started well, but after going down to 10 men in that fixture we never had a chance.

What did AVB do wrong? we've all been crying out for him to start 2 up front, he does it and because of a player error AVB still gets slammed! Had Ade not tried to snap Carzola, who knows what would have happened! It could have been a great game!

Hudds inability to beat the first man on the corners he's taken, is so embarrassing and proves to me, he's got to go, hopefully in Jan. But who could we have started in his place? Our squad is so weak and with VDV and Luka gone we seem to have no creativity if Dembele isn't available!

We have so many average (at best) players, IMO because Levy would not put his hand deep enough to get some real quality.